The Grayskull Poster from Adam to Zodac

Back in the heyday of Masters of the Universe during the 1980s, a few promotional posters for the line were made. These were lush, fully-painted depictions of the characters rather than checklists featuring photos of the action figures. By far my favorite was the so-called Grayskull Poster, because it featured most of the early, iconic MOTU characters, vehicles and playsets that I owned.

He-Man.org poster He-Lurker has been kind enough to provide his fellow He-Fans with a beautiful hi-res scan of the poster:

Pretty nice, huh? Of course, while He-Man and Skeletor look ready to mash it up as usual, there’s a lot of other strange stuff going on in the background of this poster.

Let’s star with Castle Grayskull and Snake Mountain: they are way too close. Perhaps this is the temporary result of some wizard’s spell, an attempt to get the two enemy groups to wipe each other out. If that’s the case, ordinarily I would blame Zodac–nothing would be better for cosmic peace than for all the warriors to be destroyed. However, Zodac, it seems, has chosen a side.

But I’ll get to that later. Here’s PGPoA’s A to Z analysis of every character and vehicle on this poster.

(Prince) Adam – Right off the bat we’ve got a HUGE problem here. Battle Armor He-Man is up front on Battle Cat, He-Man is driving the Dragon Walker, and Prince Adam is waving a sword around. Either Man-At-Arms got a lot better at making robots that aren’t blue and stupid, or the wizard who put Castle Grayskull and Snake Mountain about a quarter of a mile from one another also triplicated the Most Powerful Man in the Universe. Seems like overkill, especially since Skeletor only gets the one version.

Battle Armor He-Man – Maybe it’s just because there’s so much art of BA He-Man on Battle Cat, but I think he looks better on the mighty steed than the regular He-Man.

Battle Cat‘s heroic pose looks great, but it probably opens him up to an attack to his left flank by Panthor. Fortunately, Panthor is busy yelling at Skeletor for some reason.

Beast Man looks like a pimp on the Roton. Everyone else has to run down the steep, narrow cliff with a fifty-foot drop on both sides, but BM gets to sit back and let the red gear-teeth do all the work. Is he whipping Evil-Lyn like a slave driver?

Buzz-Off – Check out the goofy grin he’s giving Stratos. He’s clearly unaware that Webstor’s jagged hooks are about to tear through his whisper-thin insect wings.

Clawful – Why is he holding his mace like that? Looks awkward.

Dragon Walker – This thing dominates the cliffside, but I can’t help but wonder how it’s making the turns.

Evil-Lyn – As mentioned previously, it looks like Evil-Lyn is being whipped by Beast Man, judging from the way she’s looking back at him. “OW! Quit it, asshole!”

Fisto – Is he shaking his giant fist in rage at the bad guys–or Orko?

He-Man – Seriously, why did the marketers think it was OK to have three He-Men on this poster? No doubt it gave some kids a lingering ontological complex.

Man-E-Faces – I appreciate the artist’s desire to offer a certain level of realism via shadows, but did he have to hide Man-E-Faces’ meal ticket–his face?

Mekaneck – My favorite part of this poster. For years I thought Mekaneck was running away from the danger; it’s only recently I realized he’s using his mechanical-neck powers to look over a rock. Well, more like at a rock. Easily distracted much?

Mer-Man – I worry that Mer-Man may be a bit too precariously balanced here, especially if Beast Man whips Evil-Lyn again and she bumps into him. The dangers of running full-tilt down a steep cliff, I guess.

Orko – Two problems here: he’s walking, not floating, and he’s way too big. He also seems to be making “V for victory” signs with his fingers, which seems kind of presumptuous if you ask me.

Panthor – Great pose, but why is he looking at Skeletor?

Point Dread – Naturally one of the few cool good-guy vehicles is sitting, ignored, on the clifftop.

Ram-Man is going to f*** someone up with that axe. You can just tell.

Road Ripper – There’s a reason this Eternian equivalent of a motorcycle sits riderless next to Castle Grayskull–it sucks.

Roton – Beast Man looks real comfy in there. Say what you will about Skeletor, he doesn’t skimp on the patent leather seats in his war machines.

Screech is fixing Stratos with a death glare that probably should have killed him instantly.

Comments now closed (26)

I traded someone an Avengers #35 comic book for this poster some 20 years ago; I still have it today. I agree, it's one of my favorites out of the bunch they released, however, the poster with the Evil Horde in the center is pretty bad ass.

These posters are great. I too have the one with the Horde in the middle. I also have another poster, its not drawn, its sort of a check list with images of figures on one side, and on the other side it hilights the vehicles and playsets. Unfortunately after years and years in storage, when I took them out sometime ago, I found that it had been nibbled away by some field mice. Attic of old house = not a good place to store stuff!

@Baena: $30 for this poster seems like a steal. I've been considering going to a copying/printing business and seeing if they'd print off a high res copy for me. For a good size/quality, it'd still prolly cost around $20-ish.

Much more than the action figures and cartoon, stuff like this is really what really shines out in memory.

second.. I now have new wallpaper on my laptop.. and it is awesome.. so thank you!

and third… yes Ram Man is going to f*** someone up but good… he was a battering ram with an axe.. the only reason he didn't have a kill record in the triple digits can only be because they were all cut out due to the "kiddie cartoon" aspect of the original show.. but I'm sure, somewhere, there are many drawings of Rammy destroying one person while crushing another…

Never got this poster originally so thanks for the image, but I do have a promotional poster of Heman riding that Dragon-thingie (sorry but it's been over twenty years since I've thought about it). I wish the industry would commission this level of illustration again. It would go a long way to making packaging stand out on the pegs like they did back in the MOTU days.

i have that exact poster and it was up in my apartment for much of my college life. i still have it somewhere, in fairly good condition, though far from perfect. i always laughed at the three different he-men depicted all at once.

It's an interesting mix of fantasy and reality they've got going. Orko just looks like they sat the toy on the cliff and took a picture. I'm surprised he doesn't have a rip-stick hanging out of his side.

Also interesting to note that almost all the guys have their elbows bent, ala the figures. (And, notably, Trap Jaw's robot arm is ramrod-straight and a little cumbersome-looking.)

I can only assume that regular Skeletor is kicked back in the net hammock at Snake Mountain reading Villain Quarterly and enjoying a nice cup of coffee.

I love how the old toy lines of the 80s had these giant paintings with tons of toys in action. Does anyone do this today? It feels like almost everyone just uses toy photos instead of original artwork.

"i like castle grayskull. and i really like the roton. we don't have that vehicle, but i'd like to see a new one for the new line. i really like the talon fighter and i wish they'd make a new talon fighter w/ some new features and maybe some cannons."

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Poe Ghostal received his first toy, a Mighty Mouse figure, at age three. Thus began a lifelong interest (some might say obsession) with toys. A child of the 1980s, he grew up on Star Wars, He-Man & Transformers toys, as well as more obscure lines such as Power Lords, Robo Force, and Manglors.